


The Road to Acceptance

by Biweatherman



Series: Phil gets sick [2]
Category: Groundhog Day - Minchin/Rubin
Genre: Angst, Illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-06
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-11 17:37:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11719206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Biweatherman/pseuds/Biweatherman
Summary: Prequel to Bounded Yet Infinite looking at the time between Phil getting sick and when Bounded yet Infinite takes place





	The Road to Acceptance

Phil leapt out of bed, and then immediately had to sit down as a wave of nausea and dizziness overcame him. He took a few deep breaths before slowly getting back up and walking towards the kitchen to get an aspirin to try and get rid of the pounding headache he had. However, he refused to let either the dizziness or the headache ruin what was truly going to be a day to remember. His birthday. He had been planning this day for centuries while in the loop, and while it was nothing like he had planned, he still wasn’t quite sure why his plans had included renting out Buckingham Palace as he had no real feelings towards the British Royal Family, instead the party was being held at his apartment, with Rita and Ned offering to provide most of the food and Larry baking the cake. But, as amazing as that was going to be Phil was most excited about the guest list, which was not only quite long but also filled with new, real friends he’d made since the loop had ended. 

Phil spent most of the day watching tv and playing piano, taking the day to just relax for once, and while he did feel guilty about not spending his time helping others he tried to remind himself it was okay to take a break sometimes, and anyway it was his birthday after all. 

Phil practically bounced around his living room, which was packed with guests, his excitement taking his mind off his headache which had reappeared along with a sore throat. However, soon his headache became impossible to ignore and Phil was about to go to the kitchen for some more aspirin when the cake was brought out and he realised he couldn’t leave now and would just have to tough it out. This was harder than he thought as a ringing noise in his ears started and became progressively louder, and the noise of people singing and the heat of them all packed in one room made him feel nauseous and his head pounded and as he tried to ask for help the world tilted and went black. 

Everything after that was a blur, though Phil vaguely remembered waking up in an ambulance before being rushed into a hospital and checked over by several different doctors as well as put through different MRI and CAT scans. However he could not remember a single word that was uttered apart from the sentence he heard just now. The sentence stating he had five months to live, and that was a positive estimate assuming he was taking a full dosage of a large range of meds. For someone who had lived for centuries five months seemed ridiculously short, like he could blink and they’d be gone and he’d be gone. It seemed ridiculous that after so long a life it would be over so quickly, especially after he had been feeling fine. Sure he’d been a bit dizzy and had a headache but that was probably dehydration not anything serious. He had felt fine for weeks previously. It couldn’t be true. 

Then he realised how stupid he’d been. Of course it wasn’t true! Why had he even started to believe the doctors in the first place. He knew from experience that they only lied to try and get money out of him, and guessing from the large list of problems and treatments the doctor was rattling off this was going to be a hefty bill. Well, he wouldn’t allow them to do this to him. Phil stood up, trying to leave, but was stopped by the Doctor. 

“Mr Connors, I’d advise you to return to the bed. Mr Connors, where are you going?”

“Home. There’s nothing wrong with me, just a bit of dehydration, but nice try.”

“Nice try? What on earth do you mean, Mr Connors? Now I really would advise you to return to the bed.”

“Phil, please, just return to the bed. I know this is a lot to process, but for me just go sit back down” Rita pleaded, moving towards him and trying to lead him back to the bed. 

“Stop. I’m perfectly fine-” Phil said, tugging free of Rita’s grasp and reaching for the door handle before hunching over and throwing up on the floor and grasping onto the door handle to stop himself from collapsing as the doctor and Rita slowly moved him back to the bed. 

“I’ll call the nurses to clean that up but in the meantime can you please stay in the bed and accept that this is more than just dehydration. I’m very sorry Mr Connors but there’s no denying the facts.”

As much as Phil hated to admit it, the doctor was right, he had five months to live. Five. This number was so small and so… unfair. After all the time he’d wasted in the loop and before not really making the most out of life and now that he’s finally had the chance to make things right and live his best life it’s snatched away from him. The worst of it was the fact it had happened on his birthday, what had turned out to certainly be a day to remember, just in all the wrong ways. This day was going to be his day, a day to celebrate the ways he’d changed since the loop had ended and allow him to enjoy life and it had been ruined. He was never going to have another birthday and the most recent one was a failure and after he’d been planning that day for years it seemed like the universe was playing an incredibly cruel trick on him. He had been given the chance to see what he had been missing by wasting his life before the loop but not given the chance to truly live out that better life. A taste was all he was getting, though in his heart he knew a taste was way more than he deserved.

Phil knew it was selfish and self-centred to complain, he did. He’d had more than his fair share of time, way more and was extremely grateful he had had the chance to change at all. But this didn’t stop him from wanting more. There was still so much he hadn’t done that he’d wanted to do, for example he still hadn’t gone back to visit his childhood home or seen the ocean and he hadn’t helped nearly as many people as he wanted to. That was probably the worst of it, that in the end he still would be unable to make up for his actions in the past, the fact he would never be able to truly free his conscience. 

This thought weighed particularly heavily on his mind as the weeks moved on and he spent most of his day in bed, being surrounded by visitors. Every time someone came to visit Phil tried to enjoy it, he really did, knowing it could be one of the last times he saw them. But all he could ever see was the pain in their faces when they saw him and he hated it and he hated himself for causing that pain. All his life he’d just caused other people pain and now here he was unable to help others and causing further pain and for what? He simply spent every day in his bed doing nothing, there was no point in him being alive. 

Quietly he requested that the Doctors stop giving him all medication accept the ones for his pain, he was ready to go. Well, not ready exactly, he wished for decades more in order to truly live his life the way it should be lived. But that was not the way it was going to be and he had decided the only thing worse than dying so soon after his life was in order was causing so much pain to people who did not deserve it at all. He knew it was time, time to let go.


End file.
